Blog – Page 20 – Robert Raymond’s Blogtorium

December 26, 2011

London – Day One – A Blur

After all the worries, the concerns, all that, the trip was flawless. He went through our checkpoints and gates like we were timetabled. Mike (my brother) and I had agreed on a meet point in Gatwick and both parties showed up on time at the spot. Shared a seat on the train with Brittany (my niece) on the ride into town and watched the realization sink into her that this was London. I’d felt the same way when I’d come here in the 80’s. After getting settled in the hotel (off Gloucester Tube stop), went for a tube ride/familiarization run […]

December 26, 2011

London – Day Two – Booked Solid

With Mike and his girls off to see some things, and my sister off to see other things, JB and I headed off to see our things. We started at the National Gallery, something we’d wanted to do last trip (but had gotten sidetracked by the Transport Museum (little pun there)). Anyway, got to see all the great Turners (including the one of Dido building Carthage, which I’d had for my desktop for the year in which I wrote Fire and Bronze). Lots of gawking, lots of neat paintings… It was drizzling outside, but we squelched over to Cecil Court […]

December 28, 2011

London – Day Three – Parliamentary Proceedures

Tuesday broke crisp and clear and a touch cool. We decided that it would be the day to take in the big river boys (Ben, Abbey and Parliament). The Occupy folks were in the square across from Parliament, God love ’em. Looked like the French camped on the approach to Moscow. Brrr. I guess it’s too cold for pepper spray, or maybe the English show greater restraint towards civic protest. Anyway, we checked out Westminster Abbey first, drifting through its towering vaults and still spaces, as beautiful as I remembered it from 30 years before. The nieces seemed as awed […]

December 30, 2011

London – Day Four – High and Mighty

Wednesday – all the grownup ladies ran off to do things together (I never did find out what it was – when I’d ask, they’d giggle like Wilma Flintstone and Betty Rubble). Mike and his daughters and I tubed up to Collingdale where there is a cluster of air museums. How can you go wrong? It was Mecca for me – can you name a plane type that wasn’t there? At first I wasn’t sure – it was sorta a generic museum with a couple of planes (Sopwith Camel, Fokker DVII, ME109, ME262, some other things (how aerially urbane of […]

December 31, 2011

London – Day Five – Loops and Tates

So it was just the Italy Trio, JB, Pat and I. Funny thing but we duplicated a day from an earlier trip. First off, since the day was cold and clear, the London Eye. I must be getting older – I used to dangle 2000 feet in the air in an ultralight. Now the trip up the eye gave me a bit of vertigo. Nothing bad – focused on pictures and forced my mind to be logical (the damn thing is not going to pop off the hub and roll along the embankment!). Got some nice shots, too. There were […]

January 1, 2012

London – Day Six – Apocalypse and Train Tickets

Yes, let’s get this one started right! Look at the sinners sliding into the abyss! Look at the mountains falling on top of them! Check out that city that has flipped over and is screaming down to pulp a million people beneath it, even as it breaks apart. Unlike the movie 2012 with LA at a 20 degree tilt, this is 130 degrees! Wow! First things first – Mike & Co were still up north. Pat had all sorts of things she wanted to see (fare thee well). JB and I wanted to do the Tate Britain and see what […]

January 2, 2012

London – Day Seven – Shopping and Movies

All alone. Pat is gone, flying back this morning. Mike and his girls are doing the Zoo (something we’d enjoyed, but JB felt a touch under the weather (and the weather, itself, is turning very cold)). Its a long way across open ground to the zoo. We pass. Off to Notting Hill, an open air shopping district made popular by Hugh Grant’s movie. It’s pretty neat, too. Just blocks and blocks of marketplace stalls. JB wanted something for her sister and I tagged along. Ended up buying chocolate for the work mob (actually noticed that some of them were past […]

January 5, 2012

The eighteen percent solution

“So, my good Watson, allow me to explain how I deduced Lord Witherwank was behind this entire deplorable affair… I say, Watson, are you listening?” “Eh, Wot, Holmes? Sorry, was rather involved in my medical journals.” “But I was explaining my most recent case. And you aren’t even listening.” “I say, Holmes; I am not some sort of…. literary foil for you to explain things to. I am a doctor, with other responsibilities.” “But Lord Witherwank… The stolen jewels… The comb missing but a single tooth…” “Oh, grow up, Sherlock. I can’t always be here as an audience to your […]

January 8, 2012

ShowLog – Deland – 1/8/2012

The Jacksonville lift bridge is rattling from a constant stream of rail traffic, so much so that the draw bridge has been down for two days straight. More amazing – if you looked into the cabs of the huge Genesis, Dash-9s and Big Boys, you’d find a 10 year old boy or girl at the throttle and a grinning older conductor sitting back in the brakeman seat, enjoying the ride. It’s our second performance for the new layout at Deland, a great showplace for our new techniques and efforts. Since last time, we expanded scenery 12 feet (the urban Jacksonville […]

January 10, 2012

Best of British

Popular western (i.e. American) culture holds that the English are a fragile, cultured (even socialist) lot while we’re a brawny, can-do bunch. But nothing could be further from the truth. In my recent trip to London, I observed countless English cycle commuters making their way to work, in absolutely frigid temperatures with light rain forecast. Yes, driving in the city is a pain and you pay a congestion fee (something like ten bucks a day) so maybe they are forced to ride. Whatever. But I saw men and women riding in, doing what it took to get them where they […]